As the worst team in the NBA, the Brooklyn Nets wouldn’t appear to have much positivity surrounding the franchise. That’s how misconceptions arise.
The Brooklyn Nets are one of the NBA’s most misunderstood teams, and it’s easy to see why.
Since reaching back-to-back NBA Finals in 2002 and 2003, the Nets haven’t advanced farther than the second round of the postseason. Plus, the franchise’s greatest success took place when it was located in a different city. This makes the glorious days easily forgotten amidst its first few years in Brooklyn, which have been underwhelming, to say the least.
Perhaps the most well-known mark of the Nets’ brief history in Brooklyn was former general manager Billy King‘s notorious trade that brought Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce to Brooklyn. Two premier NBA players (despite being far past their primes) coming to the Nets instilled a new hope in the franchise and established the Nets’ status in the league as a “super team.”
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Subsequently, the Nets garnered a lot of attention from around the league, and more importantly, from fans. In 2013, the Nets ranked 16th in the NBA in attendance, their highest position since the 21st century began.
But, when the trade proved to be a failure after one year — Garnett and Pierce departed within one and a half seasons — the Nets were left to pick up the pieces. They went back to the drawing board for coaches, general managers, players and ultimately, another long, seemingly never-ending rebuild.
King was let go in January 2016. In his first interview following his departure, King claimed he “could have turned things around if he had been permitted to stay on,” but the Nets decided to move in another direction.
Enter general manager Sean Marks and head coach Kenny Atkinson, who are beginning to reverse the misconceptions associated with the team. Still, without a greater-than-amateur knowledge about the Nets, it isn’t difficult to fall deeper into this filter bubble of misconceptions.